VILLANOVA, Pa. — At 5:03 p.m. today, Jordan Theodore was the first Seton Hall player on the floor for early shootaround.

Arriving before Villanova’s team even entered its own building, Theodore put up shot after shot for nearly 35 minutes with associate head coach Shaheen Holloway. After missing a free throw to cost his team its last game, Theodore was determined to make up for it.

Less than four hours later, he not only didn’t atone for it — in the words of his head coach — Theodore tried too hard for redemption. And now, Seton Hall has to wonder for the first time this season: What’s next?

“I think what happened with Theo was the fact that he took the loss so hard the other night,” Pirates head coach Kevin Willard said of last Friday’s game against South Florida. “He said, ‘I’ll make it up, I’ll get it back for us.’ And I think he tried to put the team on his back and I think this was one of the poorest games of his year.

“But he’ll bounce back — I have tremendous confidence in him.”

After Seton Hall’s 84-76 loss tonight to the previously stumbling Wildcats, it would be easy to lay blame at the feet of the senior point guard.

Theodore went 2-for-16 from the floor and scored only 13 points. Like his teammates, he pressed for shots that weren’t there, tried to make too many plays happen and watched as Villanova (9-10, 2-5 in Big East) let Seton Hall (15-4, 4-3 in Big East) shoot themselves out of the game.

Afterward, the Pirates locker room, usually open to the media, was closed for the first time under Willard — a clear signal the problems of the last week don’t rest solely on Theodore’s shoulders, no matter how much he’d like them to.

“Look at my roster: We have two seniors who’ve never won at this level, freshmen and sophomores who have never been at this level,” Willard said. “This is an all-new experience for them. Getting articles, interviewed, all this notoriety — it’s very new to them. So you can lose focus because you read your own press clippings and say, ‘Hey, look at this, look at that.’ ... It’s very easy to lose your way if you’ve never been here before.”

Villanova turned Seton Hall’s best weapon around on itself. Entering the game as the Big East’s top 3-point shooting team, the Pirates chucked up a season-high 36 3-point attempts, but made only 12. Meanwhile, Wildcats forward JayVaughn Pinkston had a double-double with 23 points and 11 rebounds, to boost Maalik Wayns’ game-high 25 points.

Seton Hall had four players in double-figures — led by Fuquan Edwin’s 14 points — but shot just 36 percent from the floor. The Pirates were also crushed on the boards, 45-36.

“I thought we took a lot of good ones,” Willard said of the high volume of 3s. “We took some bad ones early, but I thought we had a lot of good looks. It’s probably 10 too many, but out of the 36, we probably had about 28 good looks.”

While Theodore, who took eight of those 3s, was locked up for most of the night by Wayns and Villanova’s defense, Willard strongly suggested something else was bothering his star guard. Not only the burden of the missed 1-and-1 at the end of the South Florida game, but that the officiating crew didn’t seem to be giving him any calls.

“I thought the refs bothered Theodore,” Willard said. “I thought he got a little wrapped up where he thought he was getting fouled and he wasn’t getting fouled. I also don’t think he’s getting the respect that he deserves.”

When asked to clarify if the lack of respect was from the officials, Willard said: “Yeah.”

Seton Hall will now have a week to regroup and try to stop its sudden two-game losing streak. Willard thinks his team could use the break. Now, they may need it.

“We talked about it after the game — what had gotten us to the point of where we were,” Willard said. “And making sure we stay focused, individually, on what got us there as a team. Hopefully, they’ll listen.”